


night is only half the time

by stellulam



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: implied missing of better halves, sadness and suffering tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-07
Updated: 2015-05-07
Packaged: 2018-03-29 10:28:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3892981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stellulam/pseuds/stellulam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are voids to be filled in the wake of a captain's death. AU set during an unspecified mission late S4/early S5.</p>
            </blockquote>





	night is only half the time

**Author's Note:**

> when one has been out of the writing fanfic loop for a few years (and a few fandoms), what better way to come crashing back in than with tearjerker quick scenes, right? enjoy!

Torrent Company was subdued, awash in the quiet of grief, and stuck under nearly full operational silence in a recon camp for another two days. The first joint offensive on the planet had been bloody but necessary — at least according to General Kenobi. Six casualties between two companies and one of them an officer wasn't something that made any mission look successful.

They were settled on the banks of a river outlet, spotlights left on the _Resolute_ in favour of a campfire and tents that could pass for local during a flyby. Two hours away and halfway up a mountain was a two-twelfth company. Somewhere in between were Generals Kenobi and Skywalker, the former likely still having to keep the latter from charging at the objective with all weapons lit up. Skywalker had stopped Fives for a conversation — an expectation that he would step up to fill the missing space, although that went without saying — before the generals headed out and there had been bloodlust in his gaze. Fives knew the feeling.

Where there should have been banter around the campfire there was silence, clones stripped down to body gloves and haunted expressions. The ARC trooper wasn't looking for them, though, so there was no quip as he skirted the group, unwittingly met Coric's eyes, couldn't do anything more than shake his head in response to whatever question was being asked. It didn't matter. They just had to take advantage of this little window to rest and regroup before being ready to move out at any time. Eventually, General Skywalker would need them again and Coric would be just as responsible as Fives was, from a field ranking perspective, for getting the troops moving. Right now they just had to settle in for the night, hurry up and wait. A few tents were occupied already: Kix was taking morning watch and Tup was sleeping already to let bacta work its wonders.

Fives passed a short row of tents, heading away from the fire, boots crunching the ground underfoot. There was a gap the perfect size of a single-person tent between the last one in the row and a stack of supply crates, as if things had been arranged with one more tent and then it had been taken down when it was determined not to be needed any more. The collapsed tent sat neatly folded just outside the now-last tent in the line and Fives made a note for sentries to keep an eye on this corner. The commander had insisted on taking down the tent that should have held her protector herself and none of the company had been able to deny her. They hadn't even been able to _talk_ to her, outside of the obligatory medic checkups and a comment or two on food. With the general off and the captain dead, she was the camp's ranking officer by a jump but Fives, for the first time he could ever recall, didn't think Ahsoka had it in her. She had always handled everything the war had thrown at her, to his knowledge, but how would she handle this?

He stood outside her tent and cleared his throat, swallowing the pieces of his heart that were broken for her. The grief of losing Rex hurt but the helplessness of _watching her_ lose Rex was undeniably worse.

"Commander?"

The response from within the tent was nearly immediate but from an alarmingly small sounding voice. "What is it, Fives?"

"Can I have a moment?"

"Sure. Come in."

Her tent wasn't any bigger than any of the clones' but she occupied so little space within it that it _felt_ bigger as he ducked to let himself in, eyes sweeping over the space. Ahsoka was sitting on her bedroll with her legs tucked up, hugging a pillow to her chest. Another pillow sat where it should have at the top of the roll and all but told Fives where the second pillow came from. Her lantern was on the floor, allowing her shod boots, draped with a utility belt and a pair of lightsabers, to cast a long shadow up the side of the tent. Between her and the entrance, on the foot of her roll was a white and blue helmet. Fives didn't have to spare it more than a glance to know whose it was, but he didn't know who'd brought it back to camp.

He was supposed to be here to report who was taking sentry shifts for the evening and quietly suggest she eat something. He forced himself to root to the ground, crouching mostly inside the entrance to address her. She looked like she needed something more than that pillow to hold her together and he wanted to help, even while he doubted he could.

With the lower portion of her face pressed into the stolen pillow, Fives could only see Ahsoka's eyes and forehead, but that was enough. The sienna around her eyes looked dark and puffy; the cerulean was unnaturally bright. For a moment, she simply looked at him and he looked back.

"Tez is taking first watch," he managed, eventually. "Kix'll do the wake up call. That's... all I have to report, sir."

"Kix already in his tent?" she asked, muffled by Rex's pillow, and Fives nodded. "Good."

"Are you—? I mean, have you eaten anything since we got back? The general was pretty insistent we make sure you didn't try to skip all your meals."

The togruta nodded, freeing one arm to pick up the little bowl beside her and extend it to him. Berries, picked before the first offensive push, staining the edges of the bowl a vibrant violet much higher than the line where the local fruit ends now. He trusted that she'd eaten a good few handfuls of them, but not that berries alone were enough food for a predator running herself ragged on battles and loss.

"I won't finish all these and they're human-safe. Have a few."

He took the bowl from her so she could go back to the pillow, then shifted to sit on the very end of the bed and ate a berry, contemplative. "Not bad."

"Rex liked them, too." There was an uncertain waiver to her voice that made Fives expect tears when he glanced at her, but her expression had grown bittersweet, eyes fixated on the T of Rex's bucket. He'd seen her look at the captain that way before, but he hadn't been sure enough to call it longing until now. In retrospect, it was ridiculous to think it was anything else. "If we wind up not moving out first thing, I might gather some more."

"Fresh berries with breakfast rations sounds fancy."

"Yeah, I thought so, too."

They lapsed into silence and Fives probably should have left, but he didn't have it in him to. Not when Ahsoka's face so clearly displayed her heartbreak, eyes watching the helmet on her bedroll like there was still a brother's face behind it. He didn't want to drag himself away but he didn't want to overstep. "Should I... If there's anything you need, Ahsoka, I'm here."

The teen's response was slow-coming, preceded by a little sniffle. "If you're not in a rush to turn in, would you stay?"

Late night chats were Rex's responsibility when it came to her well-being; as far as well-intentioned gossip was concerned, Ahsoka was more apt to call on him than her master late at night. Or she had been. There was a void there now and Fives wasn't sure if he felt like a cheap replacement or not for being invited to fill it.

He nodded and she tried to smile at him, failing before letting it go and reaching out to pick up the helmet between them. There was a little black device underneath it and she scooped that up, too. A holorecorder, Fives realized as she put it with her utility belt and sat the helmet to stare at the fabric wall near her boots; he wondered suddenly if hearing whatever recording it held through the helmet helped. It was what he would have done, in her place. Had there been a helmet.

"I think I'm still in shock," Ahsoka said, voice thinner than it should have been but inviting conversation anyway. Dutifully, Fives shifted to sit a little more fully on her bedroll, surprised when she extended her bent legs enough to tuck her toes under his thigh. "It's terrible, being a soldier all the time, because every loss hurts, but you just have to keep fighting. When I was twelve, my favourite duelling instructor at the Temple left to do a mission for the Council — this was before the war — and never came back," she continued, obviously needing to get her words out. "It was the first loss I really _felt_ and I was lost for days. Some people are just too big to lose so quickly."

He thought she was keeping herself from being lost better than he would have imagined, but he didn't say so, just nodded and helped himself to a few more berries. "I know the feeling, I think."

"I remember how much pain you were in when we lost Echo. I wanted to help."

"You did help," Fives insisted quietly. The parallel wasn't lost on him and if how she needed him was to have him sit and listen to her talk about nothing and everything and every dumb joke Rex ever tried to tell, he would be here.

Ahsoka smiled faintly, but her eyes started to water. "I know there's no way he would have rather gone out," she said, tilting her head to press a cheek to the pillow still tenderly cradled against her body. "But that doesn't make me any less angry at him for the timing. He was going to take me sniping at the range next time we were back on Coruscant and I— How is it fair that missing one person can hurt this much, Fives?"

All of a sudden, she wasn't just teary, she was sobbing, and Fives was at a loss for what to do short of holding her. Even that, he did tentatively: setting the berry bowl down, reaching his arms out to her, shifting a little. Caution need not have been applied, it proved, as she flung herself against his chestplate with a ragged cry of nothing short of primal pain, arms around him tight enough to feel the squeeze through his armour. He wished that he weren't wearing it for one selfish moment, just so that he could hold her better, and then scolded himself for the thought as he raised a hand to stroke along the length of the head tail at the back of her neck in what he hoped was a soothing gesture.

"You'll be okay, 'Soka. It hurts like hell when you love 'em, but you're the strongest person I know, so you'll be okay." If _love_ was the wrong thing to call it, she didn't indicate as much and he was grateful for that. He didn't want to talk about the way he had loved Echo any more than he wanted to talk about the way she had loved Rex. But Fives understood grief, losing the person that was supposed to have your back indefinitely. Ahsoka had forced him to have tea instead of caf and eat something healthy and patted his hair soothingly after the Citadel mission. He didn't like that he had to return the favour, but he would — now and whenever she needed him to.

Between soothing words and gentle touches, Ahsoka cried herself out, although it took a few long minutes minutes and the sobbing was so violent Fives had to hold her tighter for fear her she would hurt herself on her body-racking sobs. She ultimately wound up curled up on one hip, her head propped on his thigh, while his fingers rubbed circles underneath the lek at the back of her neck. Making a palpable effort to regulate her breathing, Ahsoka relaxed against him, then reached a hand out to grab the bowl Fives had set aside, pulling it toward her and plucking a few berries to eat. She half-raised it in an offer and apparently didn't have to see Fives to see the shake of his head as he passed.

He had assumed that would mean more berries for her, but instead he watched as she started squashing the berries against the sides and bottom of the bowl, turning them to mush and dyeing her fingers and palm with their pigment. That was the point, he eventually realized, watching her coat her hand and then slowly, agonizingly, push herself up. He dropped his hand from her neck to her back but refused to let go entirely as she looked at those with those puffy, too-blue eyes. She seemed to be trying to ask a question he didn't have the answer to and for all the Jedi wisdom he knew she possessed, no other source provided that answer.

So Ahsoka pressed her pigment-coated hand to his chestplate, a slender and small, violet handprint slipping away at the bottom. Not the staining blue of blood but the gesture was poignant anyway.

Knowing he had to return it somehow, Fives dipped two fingers to the bowl and coated them, pulling them away purple and using them to draw ceremonial slashes of colour on the white of her montrals, nestled safely between blue chevrons. Her eyes dropped shut as he did it and he had a feeling she was seeing the Jaig eyes by touch; the feeling was confirmed when he dropped his hand and she opened her eyes once again to give him a soft smile.

"I'll be okay," she said softly. He wasn't sure who she was trying to convince, but Fives nodded anyway, knowing it to be true. "I just might need someone watching my back until I get used to…"

"You can count on me." It would have been cruel to make her finish her line of thought there. He knew from the others that Rex had been tasked with watching Ahsoka, getting her caught up with how to fight a war from day one and he knew from seeing it that there wasn't a task the captain had ever taken more seriously. Not seeing them together again in a firefight would be strange for the whole company.

"Thank you, Fives."

Ahsoka's kiss was brief, but sweet and grateful and more or less platonic. Fives wondered once again what sort of replacement he would need to be even as he cherished it, lightly touching his hand to her arm as she laid down with her head in his lap again.

"You'll feel better after some sleep," he told her, hoping she wouldn't be plagued too harshly by dreams. Fives couldn't stay indefinitely, couldn't guess what his brothers would have to say about that, but as she nodded and exhaled, relaxing against him, he decided it would be cruel to leave before she fell asleep and so he stayed.


End file.
